Perhaps, but it's also become clear that Google is finding other ways to
improve the service. The company Oct. 15 enhanced Google Health to help
visually impaired people access the service from their computers using self-voicing
browsers or screen reader applications.

T.V. Raman,
a research scientist who is blind and focuses on accessibility technology for
Google, wrote in a blog post that Google has improved the usability of Google
Health for screen reader users by enhancing the built-in support available in GWT 1.5 through
JavaScript.

Now screen reader and/or self-voicing browser users can easily navigate the
Google Health interface to obtain auditory information. These enhancements,
which include widgets, were implemented using the World Wide Web Consortium's
ARIA (Accessible Rich Internet Applications), a set of Web standards that
allow AJAX applications to work
with assistive technologies. Raman wrote:

With these enhancements, I can now easily navigate Google Health to not
only manage my own health records; Google Health enables me to quickly research
various relevant health conditions, track medications and do a myriad
health-related tasks.

Raman said accessibility support in Google Health requires support from both
the browser and the adaptive technology in use. Raman recommends using Firefox
3.0 with screen readers that support ARIA, or Fire Vox, the self-voicing
extension to Firefox 3.0.

Raman provides a number of instructions
in this blog post; users will use navigation keys to go to categories with
information, including height and weight, which will be spoken to them.

The integration of W3C ARIA with the Google Web Toolkit to make Google Health
work for visually impaired users is quite a coup for Google and for assistive
technology overall.

It's unclear how many users have signed in and are actively using Google
Health, but the move is one step of many Google will have to take to effectively compete with Microsoft's more established HealthVault service.

ReadWriteWeb calls Google Health versus Microsoft HealthVault a
kind of Coke versus Pepsi battle, but if users aren't signing up at a
prodigious rate, then they're fighting over nothing.

I've asked Google and Microsoft how many consumers are using their respective
health platforms and will update if possible.